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Neighbour recounts rescuing girl after Israeli strike kills her family in Rafah
A neighbour has described the attack on the Abu Taha family that killed at least five people.
“The owner of the house is a perfume salesman. He has nothing to do with any political or armed groups. All of a sudden, a barrel bomb dropped and destroyed four homes facing the house that was targeted. The residential tower is full of displaced people. A large number of those killed and wounded were from the targeted house as well as the residential building. It is a scene of massive destruction. Unarmed civilians that have nothing to do with any political groups,” the neighbour said.
He added that he rescued a girl following the attack. “I rescued her from their balcony. She was literally hanging there,” the neighbour said. “So far, it seems she is the only survivor from her family. The only survivor from the targeted home.”
Al Jazeera has also obtained footage of rescue operations at the al-Khatib home in Rafah’s Janina neighbourhood. The video shows workers lowering a man on a stretcher after he was wounded in the attack. Two women and a child were among the four people killed in the bombing there.
What role do US tech giants play in powering Israeli war crimes?
After Amazon and Google signed a $1.2bn contract to launch Project Nimbus, providing cloud technology to the Israeli government and the military, tech workers have started to notice more Israeli use of artificial intelligence against the Palestinian people.
Many of those engineers have become activists for “No Tech for Genocide”, including Zelda Montes, who was among the dozens of Google staff who were fired recently for protesting against their company’s involvement with Israel.
In this episode of The Bottom Line, Montes and tech entrepreneur Paul Biggar, who founded Tech for Palestine, tell host Steve Clemons why they refuse to build technology used for oppression, surveillance, warfare and apartheid.
US senator questions if State Department is properly assessing Israeli conduct
Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat, has questioned whether the Biden administration is properly assessing Israel’s compliance with international law, following a report from the Reuters news agency that some senior US officials did not find the country’s assurances credible.
“This reporting casts serious doubt on the integrity of the process in the Biden administration for reviewing whether the Netanyahu government is complying with international law in Gaza,” he said in a statement.
The Reuters report found that some senior State Department officials have advised Secretary of State Antony Blinken that they do not find “credible or reliable” Israel’s assurances that it is using US-supplied weapons in accordance with international humanitarian law.
Blinken must tell Congress by May 8 whether he finds Israel’s assurances credible. According to an internal State Department memo, several bureaus within the agency did not find Israel’s statements credible, citing military actions that raised questions about potential violations of international humanitarian law.
Van Hollen said the Reuters report had found that the recommendations of those bureaus “were swept aside for political convenience”.
“The determination regarding compliance with international law is one of fact and law. The facts and law should not be ignored to achieve a pre-determined policy outcome. Our credibility is on the line,” he said.
Yep, it's going to look even worse when the ICC issues arrest warrents for Netanyahu and his cronies.
